Stand Up – Chapter 1 – The Infection Spreads
"TGISBFAO!"
"Um, what?"
"Well Lily dear, it obviously stands for 'Thank God It's Saturday Because Fridays Are Over-rated'."
Sunny made a gesture and face that pretty much meant, 'well, duh.' In response Lily raised an eyebrow and patted her friend on the shoulder. "Whatever you say, amor."
Sunny ruffled her short light brown hair with one hand and harrumphed, "Hey! You make it sound like I'm some lunatic that people need to agree with whatever they say or else I'll go all psycho."
Lily stopped suddenly and put a hand dramatically to her chest, she gasped, "Wait, so your mother lied to me!"
Sunny playfully smacked her friend on the shoulder. "Not funny. Don't make me touch your mango!"
"This coming from a person with the sex appeal of a penguin," retorted Lily.
The two girls glared at each other for a couple of seconds and promptly burst into laughter afterwards. It was a strange day if obscure references to a book series were not made between them. The duo made a peculiar pair walking throughout the small shopping centre; Sunny's tall figure towered over the diminutive Lily, there were practically one third of a metre between their respective heights.
Still giggling over their earlier dork moment, they walked into the food court, shopping bags in hand, and headed over to an empty table to set their items on. Sunny plopped down on a seat as Lily took out a blue pouch from her messenger bag and placed it on the table.
"So do you want me to wait for you to do your med stuff or do I go order now," asked Sunny whilst gesturing to the syringe and alcohol swab that Lily had taken out.
Lily thought about it for a moment, biting her lip in concentration before deciding, "Stay, I need to know my sugar level before I decide what to eat."
Sunny shrugged her shoulders in response, and took out a magazine she had bought earlier out from one of her bags. She started to rifle through it as Lily checked her blood glucose and prepared the insulin she would inject.
Okay, so the number was 112*…three measures of Humulin N and two measures of Humalog. Lily started to hum a song as she passed an alcohol swab over the soon-to-be injection site on her lower stomach. She grabbed the syringe from the table, uncapped the orange tip, lifted her shirt a bit, and angled the needle. And cue the mental mood music.
She took a deep breath. All right, three…two…and on-
"OH MY GOD YOU'RE HUMMING WHAT MAKES YOU BEAUTIFUL!"
The unexpected words startled her and she almost plunged the needle at the wrong angle. She glared at her friend's overly excited smile and frankly quite scary expression. Sunny's eyes practically popped out of their sockets, her smile threatened to split her face from how wide it was.
"Sunny, what have I told you about making noise when I'm putting my insulin?"
Her friend's brown eyes widened and her pale cheeks flushed pink, "I'm so sorry! It's just that I haven't met that many One Direction fans here in Puerto Rico and I didn't even know that my best friend liked them and –"
Lily clenched her teeth, rolled her eyes, and resisted the urge to sock her obsessive friend in the face. "First of all, talk later. Secondly and most importantly, insulin now. I'm kinda busy preventing my death."
Sunny smiled sheepishly and whispered, "Okay, okay, sorry. I'll resist, mala mia."
Lily rolled her eyes exasperatedly. Honestly, the way this girl obsessed was unmatched.
Now, back to business. Angling the needle again over the skin of her stomach – she gave Sunny a pointed look before proceeding further – she plunged forward and broke skin.
She hissed at the stinging sensation as she felt the small needle creep further into the fatty area of her lower stomach. Lily took the needle out gently and glared at the rivulet of blood that poured out.
Fuck, I broke a capillary.
"Why the hell did you just swerve, Sonieliz?"
Lily held her hand to her chest, trying to settle down her racing heart. She would have smacked the girl for nearly giving her a heart attack if it weren't for the fact that said girl was driving, if she could even call what Sunny had just done "driving."
"What do you mean you haven't seen the music video, Liana? And I thought you a Directioner! I bet you didn't even know that they were on X-factor or that they're backed by Simon Cowell." The tall girl gripped the steering well tightly and rapidly shot a withering look at Lily before leaving her eyes on the road again.
Lily gave her a 'you can't be serious look' before answering, "And that's grounds for suicide by intentional car crash?"
Sunny groaned, "I didn't mean to almost hit the railing. You just took me by surprise."
"The railing that protects us from a fifty foot cliff," remarked Lily, "Remind me to never throw you a surprise party, you'd probably murder the poor bastard next to you."
"Anyway, what do you even know about One Direction," inquired Sunny as she drove on to the road leading to Lily's house.
"That they're called One Direction and have a fabulous single called 'That's What Makes You Beautiful'."
Screeech. Sunny hit the brakes, causing the momentum to throw Lily forward. "And that's it?"
"Mujer, what did you do the person who administered your driving test? Drug them?" The younger girl's hands were gripping the seat; the usual deeply tanned skin had paled in fright.
Sunny absentmindedly waved her hand and said, "Never mind our lives. You are going to your e-mail later because I'm going to send you internet links of everything a Directioner needs to know as soon as I get home."
Lily snorted in laughter and face-palmed – there really wasn't anything else she could do. She sighed in resignation, "Just get me home, Sunny."
"I'm going to Facebook stalk you until you embrace the One Direction infection, you know that right?"
Lily whipped her head to the side in order to face Sunny, a smirk graced her features. "I can count on one hand how many times I've been on Facebook since I made the account this summer, so good luck with that."
Ring. Ring.
Lily closed her eyes and sighed, trying to block out the sound of her mobile. It had been ringing nonstop for the past ten minutes, and she was pretty damn sure she knew the identity of the caller - without having to look at screen of the phone.
Ring. Ring. Ring.
"Shut up," Lily groaned into her pillow as the mobile's screen flashed light into the darkness of her bedroom, yet again.
Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring.
Lord Jesus, it's two in the fucking morning. Slowly, Lily sat up on her bed. She contemplated giving in and answering the phone, Lord knows that would stop the racket. And yet, as soon as the thought entered her mind she felt her heart harden. That's exactly what she wants, Lily told herself. She'd be damned if she gave up so easily.
Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring.
Apparently Lily was damned.
The dark haired girl groaned in exasperation and fetched her mobile from the bedside table. She forcefully flipped the top lid, pushed the little green button, and angrily pressed the phone to her ear.
"You have five seconds to convince me to not slip arsenic into your drink tomorrow."
"Jesus, someone's recovering from a sugar low. Let me guess, your BG was somewhere around the 60s tonight, am I right?"
Lily rolled her eyes, "No. 50s. Speak, Sunny. I know you didn't call me to discuss my diabetes. Now, why did you wake me up at this ungodly hour?" Lily's eyelids were drooping with sleep, the complete darkness of the room –besides the light of the mobile – did not help her case at all.
"Kindly hop off my dick, porfavor. Don't take out your wonky health on me; I just called to check if you'd seen all the videos of One Direction I sent you. I'm assuming you didn't though, considering you're not squealing and basking in the awesomeness of these fine five angels."
The young girl palmed her face. "Motherfu-"
"Oh nu-uh, language mija; you know, for being an English major you sure like to defile the language way too often."
Sighing dramatically, Lily let a rueful grin spread across her lips as she mentally shook her head at Sunny's antics. "Fine. You win, I'll go look up the links you sent me. Now you kindly hop off my nonexistent male genitals and don't call until after noon."
"So you're willing to throw around the word fuck as easy as you please but you can't say dick or pe-"
Lily ended the call before the conversation got out of hand. She snorted in laughter as she rose up out of her bed to search for her laptop – and unbeknownst to her, the obsession of a lifetime.
Hola, it's Sunny! Sorry for not being here, leave a voicemail at the beep, porfavor. BEEP.
"CAUSE WE'RE LIKE NA NA NA! THEN WE'RE LIKE YEAH YEAH YEAH!
Girl, why are you not answering my phone? I blame you for all my music obsessions! AH, I hate you- no I love you but I'm not making any sense 'cause it's effin' four in the morning and I watched all their video diaries and liveshows and auditions and stupid damn it EVERYTHING! That music video was beautiful! My emotions! I can't contain them! This is all your fau-"
Beep. Voicemail ended.
Beep. Beep.
You have received 1 text message from Sunny-D
POTATOOOOO!I, Sunny Robles, am fully responsible for any damage done to Liana Rosado Medina's person due to One Direction Infection. BTW, NIALLER IS MINE! ;p
Glossary:
Amor – love
Mujer – woman
Mala mia – my bad
Porfavor – please
Mija – portmanteau of 'mi hija' which means my daughter, but can also be used to refer directly to a close female; kind of like in English when people refer to as females as "Hey, girl."
x.O.x.O.x.O.x
Author's Note:
Well this was a weird chapter to write (because Lily is not really that much like me and it is fun to write characters that are different). Is it strange that these events are – again – mostly based on real life? :D
1D owes their career to electricity. I owe my 1D infection to a combination of Tumblr, "Sunny", and Youtube – in that order.
So as always, tell me what you think, feel free to ask questions 'cause I'll answer them in a PM, and I'm so glad none of you have predicted yet what's going to happen – or who Lily will end up with. It's funny; because I've dropped little subtle hints (I'm so evil, not).
By the way, if anyone caught the The Mortal Instruments by Cassandra Clare at the beginning of the chapter, you are awesome. If not, go read the series because it's fabulouis!
Simply,
ThatOneDiabeticGirl